2014 European Championships Preview

by Klaus Reinhold Kany

(14
January 2014) European championships have had a history of
more than one hundred years and are almost as big as the World
Championships. For the seventh time they are held in the Hungarian
capital of Budapest. Originally the federation had planned to
organize the event in the same big Laszlo Papp arena (named after a
famous Hungarian boxer) in which it took place in 2004. But this
arena is so expensive that they decided to go to the provincial city
of Debrecen, about 150 miles east of Budapest. Then the ISU
intervened and argued that they had given the championships to
Budapest and no other city. So the Hungarians chose a near-by
exhibition hall called “Syma Arena” in Budapest which they
transformed into an ice rink with about 6,000 provisional spectator
seats. And as a kind of thank you the ISU gave Debrecen the Junior
World Championships in 2016.

Normally
all European top skaters compete at the European championships. But
this time in the Hungarian capital of Budapest the new team event at
the Olympic Games soon after Europeans changes the situation a bit.
The two top ice dance couples Péchalat/Bourzat from France and
Bobrova/Soloviev from Russia do not compete in Budapest, but stay in
their training rinks in the USA and Russia to prepare for Sochi.
Therefore the top favorites in the ice dance competition are now
Anna Cappellini and Luca Lanotte from Italy who train part time in
Milan, Italy and part time with Igor Shpilband in Novi, Michigan.
Their biggest contenders are Nikolai Morozov’s Russian team of Elena
Ilinykh and Nikita Katsalapov. If everything goes normal, the other
teams can fight only for the bronze medal. Among them is the second
Russian team Ekaterina Riazanova/Ilia
Tkachenko, the German champions Nelli Zhiganshina/Alexander Gazsi
(her brother is competing for Russia with Viktoria Sinitsina) and
the British champions Penny Coomes/Nicholas Buckland.

In the ladies
competition, there might be a fight for gold between the five time
European champion Carolina Kostner (26) from Italy and the two much
younger Russian teenagers Adelina Sotnikova and Julia Lipnitskaia.
Kostner had skipped her Nationals in December, citing back problems.
But she had prepared a new short program to Schubert’s “Ave Maria”
with her choreographer Lori Nichol in Oberstdorf and revived her
last year’s Bolero long program instead of the Shcerezade program
which did not get very positive criticism at her Grand Prix.
Sotnikova became Russian champion for the fourth time in December.
Lipnitskaia was second at the Grand Prix Final two weeks earlier.
Other candidates for top positions are Elene Gedevanishvili from
Georgia, Maé-Bérénice Méité from France, Valentina Marchei from
Italy (who trains in Detroit), Alena Leonova from Russia, and
Viktoria Helgesson from Sweden.

Last
year’s European men’s champion Javier Fernandez from Spain has not
been in top shape in this season yet, therefore he did not reach the
Grand Prix Final. But nevertheless he is a gold medal contender.
Russia comes with three skaters, among them the new Russian champion
Maxim Kovtun who beat Evgeni Plushenko at Russian Nationals. If he
wins or at least skates very well in Budapest again, he will get the
Russian federation into trouble when they have to decide which only
skater to send to the Olympic Games. Plushenko opted not to compete
at Europeans in order to save in energy for Sochi and not to lose
again against Kovtun. But if Plushenko’s energy is limited, how will
be able to compete at the Olympics four times? The rule is clear: If
a country has only one spot at the Olympics (like Russia has), the
skater who does the team competition also has to do the individual
event. Except if one Russian does the team event and declares
afterwards that he is injured and cannot do the individual event any
more, so that the alternate will come in. But it is somewhat unfair
if you know in advance that you will be injured after the team
event. Plushenko has at least reached on goal by being in the media
for weeks: It helps him to make more money for his shows. So with
these controversies he at least proved to be a good business man.

At Europeans the two other Russian skaters Sergei Voronov (third at
Nationals) and Konstantin Menshov (fourth) will also fight for a
medal. But there are more male skaters who are able to win a medal
if they skate well: The two French skaters Florent Amodio (National
Champion this year) and Brian Joubert (who has worked with Nikolai
Morozov in Moscow in the last ten days) as well as the two Czech
skaters Tomas Verner (first at Nationals) and Michal Brezina. So the
men’s field is quite open.

In the
pairs event a fight for gold between the reigning European and world
gold medalists Tatiana Volosozhar/Maxim Trankov from Russia and the
Grand Prix Final winners Aliona Savchenko and Robin Szolkowy from
Germany can be expected. Four pairs are candidates for the bronze
medal: The new Russian champions Ksenia Stolbova/ Fedor Klimov (who
only won because Volosozhar/Trankov decided not to compete), the
third Russian pair Vera Bazarova/Yuri Larionov,
the Italian champions Stefania Berton/Ondrej Hotarek and the French
champions Vanessa James/Morgan Ciprès.